Throwing Bricks at Rothko.

Here's a silly little joke my husband and I share:

Before we got married, my husband's Crazy Ex Girlfriend sent him several emails escalating into a final you're-a-terrible-person, your-mother-must-be-so-devastated and I-never-want-to-speak-to-you-again essay. This was all because he told her he was getting married. I could go into further detail and discuss the circumstances that led up to this, in order to satisfy my claim that she is indeed crazy, but you'll just have to take my word for it because I don't have the energy to go into it and also I have to take her possible feelings into consideration. I mean, does she really want the whole world to know that she took a bath with another one of my husband's ex-girlfriends and then called my husband's mother to tell her about it?

It was a strange thing to happen but we've somehow managed to glean some humour out of the whole situation. One of her main complaints was that we hadn't been together long enough, particularly long enough to have had a "real" fight:

"Have you guys even fought yet? I don't mean a mild disagreement either. I mean the kind of fight that makes you want to hit the other person with a brick for just a split second."

(I found that quote by searching for the word "brick" in my email)

Now, I don't know about anyone else, but I have never, ever wanted to hit anyone with anything, let alone a brick. At the time I thought it was a weirdly violent thing to say (and still do) and pointed it out. Then one of us suggested that maybe we couldn't get married because we didn't have any bricks to throw at each other and that we would need to obtain some bricks in order to be able to have a proper fight. It's a nice way to bring out the real absurdity in her statement. Ryan's mum's in on the joke too.

We see bricks lying on the side of the road and one of us will say, "Hey! Should have a fight? I see some bricks." or, we'll start a small argument about something and one of us will say, "Whoa. We can't do this. No bricks on hand."

Today on CL I noticed that there were free bricks available in Lansing.

me: Someone's giving away free bricks on CL.

Ryan: Maybe they just had a break up and don't need them anymore

me: I read the ad. Apparently, they are overwhelmed with responses.


Ryan: like, "We're getting married in May and don't yet have our bricks. Could you deliver them?"

me: "I really want to buy an expensive piece of equipment that my wife thinks is unnecessary. Are the bricks still available?"

"I'd like to bring up certain things about the way my husband puts his pants on in the morning, but I ran out of bricks last week discussing the way he takes the garbage out. How many bricks do you have to offer?"

Ryan: "I really need your bricks. man. I am totally sick and fucking tired of the way she picks at her toenails."

"My wife thinks I am lazy. I think she's fat. I can pick up and haul away as many bricks as you can offer."

"My wife spends money like its water. So, obviously I can't afford to pay much for the bricks, but as you can see, I really need them."

me: "I'm planning on asking the woman of my dreams to marry me. I want her to understand how committed I am to her and this marriage, so I'd like to stockpile some bricks."

Ryan: "My husband and I have been in a wonderful, loving relationship for 8 years, and we just recently ran through the last of our wedding bricks. Not having bricks to hand has been a real strain on our relationship. Are your bricks still available?"

To date, Ryan and I have only had two real arguments. Neither of which resulted in us wanted to cause bodily harm to the other. One was when Jeeves got too rough with me and grabbed at my head with his paws, getting his claws right in my scar. I curled up in a fetal position and tried not to vomit (I don't like people touching my scar, let alone digging their claws into it) and Ryan instructed me that I had the wrong reaction, that I should have disciplined the dog. He's right in some regards, but in the other, more pressing at the time regard, I was in too much pain and too upset to deal directly with the situation. He came around later, when I explained to him exactly what had happened and showed him the scratch marks.

The other big fight was in the Tate Modern, with extenuating circumstances. It takes some amount of talent to have a huge fight in a museum and we never resolved. Rather, we just agreed to joke about it instead of fight about it from then on with Ryan periodically sending me Rothkos that he made with Microsoft Paint. 

"The border didn't turn out as well as I wanted it to, but my three minutes ran out."

My Own Rothko

by Ryan